Emerging Artists Beware: Commissions and Paid Art

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Emerging Artists Beware: Commissions and Paid Art

Posted by Sabtastic - November 26th, 2013

I wish someone told this to me when I was 12 years old and just starting out with art.
This is a message to all the new and emerging artists interested in breaking into the art industry:
If you've ever tried selling your artwork, you need to know that there are people out there who will willingly (or unknowingly) take advantage of you as an artist and I want you to know how to spot them, and how not to undersell yourself.

Being paid with "exposure" or "free advertisement" and "good experience":
This is one of the worst and most prominent issues I've experienced as an artist: No matter what, "exposure" is not an acceptable form of payment for you as an artist. At the end of the day, you're not being compensated for your time and talents. Exposure might sound useful if you don't have a lot of viewers or subscribers yet, but it doesn't guarantee you any more job offers, n'or does it put money in your pocket. You can't pay bills with "exposure", and respectable employers know that. Don't be afraid to call people out on these things. Often times they don't understand or appreciate the value of art.

Here are some actual examples of what this might look like:
- "Pay? Are you kidding me? This is going to be a viral hit!"
- "I want to find someone who can work with me as a partner and not an "employee"."
- "I know this may not attract as many artists, but the ones that are only looking to get paid are not the ones that we are looking for"
- "This is an unpaid position but great experience. Carly Rae Jepson will be attending."
- "since I'm not intending to sell this I don't want to be paying for artwork."

Quotes from @Forexposure_txt on Twitter.

"Contests" or "Collaborations" disguised as Crowd-Sourced Design Scams:

99Designs is an example, and this video makes me sick. Art contests and collaborations can be innocent enough, but be cautious when volunteering your time and talent for them. Often they're just an excuse for businesses or individuals to pay a small flat rate as a "prize" for a large selection of free artwork that they can use for their own benefit. You're literally giving your work away for free if you're not successful. It's like buying a cheap lottery ticket for a chance to win your paycheck, and that's not fair to you as an artist.

Companies that use crowd-sourced design are real and somehow thriving. Stay away! They don't care about you, and they're just interested in getting what they want for as cheap as possible!

Protect Your Artistic Career. Know your worth.
Stephen Silver couldn't have said it better in his Youtube video. You as an artist have a marketable skill. Your work has taken years if not decades to perfect. Although there may be artists out there with similar skills, no one is exactly the same as you, and they don't possess your style. You're marketing your unique product to people that probably can't create the artwork themselves. When you sell artwork for $5-10, even $20 or $100 dollars, think about how many hours you put into the project. If you spent 3 hours drawing something you sold for $20 dollars, you're giving yourself LESS THAN MINIMUM WAGE---less than 7 dollars per hour, to be exact. That's not fair to you, even if you enjoy that particular project, or it's for a 'friend'.

Art "Requests":
These are not commissions. If someone approaches you with an "art request", it's usually safe to safe to assume that this person has absolutely NO intention of paying you.
Do not agree to these if you think you can convince them to pay you later.

How and When to Accept Payment for your Artwork:
Although it can depend on the type of artwork involved, you can avoid being ripped off by taking payments up-front, and you shouldn't be afraid to demand that. I take all of my payments through Paypal.com or in person. Imagine spending days, weeks, or months on a project, only to have the person who agreed to pay you disappear completely, or even worse, STEAL your completed artwork without paying you a cent. This can and will happen if you aren't careful, and it's happened to me. Of course the opposite can be true with artists running away with payments, but that's another matter entirely. Another approach is to accept a down payment of 50% before beginning your work, and then accepting the rest of the payment upon completion. It's also useful to type up a contract or some form of written agreement, to make sure you and the payee are on the same page. Additionally, keeping records of your conversations as a paper trail is strongly recommended.

______________________________________________________

All in all, there are a lot of "starving artists" out there because we constantly under-sell ourselves.
Hopefully this post is useful to you, and/or your artistic friends.

Also feel free to share your experiences and add your input! We can all learn from each other.

Comments

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sorohanro 2013-11-26 21:11:25

Same thing goes with music. The "we make a movie/presentation/website/whatever/spaceship, but we don't have any money for music" is one of the most popular.

Sabtastic 2013-11-26 21:11:25

Man, music has got to be abused just as much IF NOT MORE than the graphic arts industry does!

I feel for ya man.

Gianni 2013-11-26 21:26:37

I hear exposure is surprisingly low in nutritional value, and my electric company keeps telling me that it's not legal tender.

I do amateur work for amateurs, all for free. They'll see less than a dime in pathetic ad revenue, and a lot of these people have offered to split that whole ten cents with me. But seriously, when someone rolls up in an e-mail that has a signature, a logo, a link to a website, and continuously refers to themselves as "us" or "we", but they're still not paying a dime, my eyebrow raises an extra inch beyond its normal skepticism.

Seriously, "professional" just means you get paid for it. So what kind of "professional" isn't paying? You wanna be the businessman? Fine, that's fine, but real businessmen buy their fucking assets, you clown. Take your cheap suit somewhere else and come back to me when you can afford a real one, and come back when you want to run a real business.

Sabtastic 2013-11-26 21:26:37

Haha oh my god, I hate the big "we, us" mysterious business/studio thing... It's seriously one of my biggest pet peeves. Half the time, it's some 14 year old kid trying to sound impressive and trick artists into making concept art of his SUPER TOP SECRET COPYRIGHTED ONE OF A KIND original character.

They treat it as if they're the CEO of some big famous trademarked production studio and it's always so obvious they're not what they say they are.

Sorry if that's a bit of a random tangent -- it just happens a lot. lol

DarkGlint 2013-11-26 21:30:42

Thanks for taking the time to write all this out for us new artists. It's nice to have the warning and what to look for all right here.

Sabtastic 2013-11-26 21:30:42 (Updated 2013-11-26 23:10:02)

No problem!

I mean, it's not all 100% written in stone, so please take my experience with a grain of salt.
All in all, you've just gotta do what you feel is best for you. At the end of the day, if you feel like you got ripped off, you probably did, and you'll learn from it as you get more experienced.

Blordow 2013-11-26 22:29:08

I won a contest on 99designs about 5 years back. I remember being super stoked winning a big amount of cash for putting in such little effort, but it was all too good to be true. After winning I never heard from the contest holder and was never paid. Needless to say it was a lesson learnt and I never participate in anything that requires you to make something before paying anymore :P

Sabtastic 2013-11-26 22:29:08

No way...! It's been around that long?
Ugh, that's so infuriating... Sorry you had such a shitty experience man.

Funny story, (on a related note) but years ago, I did something similar on DeviantART where I held an art contest because I wanted some fan art for my birthday. It was all legit and I gave the winners that the judges chose whatever prizes they were promised, but now that I look back on it, I feel horrible that the same kind of concept applies to what I hosted. I didn't end up profiting off of anything in the end, n'or did I intend to, but I got all this extra free fan art from the people who didn't win 1st, 2nd, or 3rd place.

Saminat 2013-11-26 22:30:02

They actually tell you this in the modeling industry you know. They call it "prestige" work. You don't get paid, but you get exposure. It's a pretty different world out there than it is with art, but the concept is still bitter tasting, no matter how you slice it.

Sabtastic 2013-11-26 22:30:02

No doubt...!

I hadn't heard of prestige work before you told me...! Thanks for the info!

squeakytoad 2013-11-26 22:40:13

I only worry that this might deter collaboration between fellow independent artists, who may now all start glancing at each other suspicious of who's ripping off whom.
I don't really make money off 90% of the animations I create. It's why I have to take breaks from animating when life gets busy. It's a hobby for me.
When I ask a musician to throw music toward a project that I'm likely only going to make $15sh on from YouTube ads, I'm not scamming him. I used to animate scenes for other artists on this site because I liked their work, and we'd collaborated quite a bit. I'm fairly certain they also wasn't making much more than a few ad dollars.

"That's not fair to you, even if you enjoy that particular project, or it's for a 'friend'."

I didn't feel it's unfair to me. We're a community of mostly casual hobbyists helping each other out. There's not a huge market out there just demanding we quit our dayjobs and pick up our tablet pens or recording mics or musical instruments of choice.
While this might be great advice for someone trying to make it professionally, it'd be too bad if someone walked away from this post never willing to collaborate or help another artist out, afraid they're being cheated out of something.

Sabtastic 2013-11-26 22:40:13

I'd be a huge hypocrite if I said I didn't collaborate and work with other artists for free. In fact, Newgrounds is great for its' plethora of awesome collabs and artists to work with! I actually do those all the time... but when I choose to, it's entirely for my own benefit. I'm aware that I'm not going to be making money, and I usually consider these artists friends, so it's not just random work I'm tossing out to anyone.

You totally raise a great point, btw, and I realize that the whole 'collaboration' paragraph could be wildly misinterpreted, so I'm glad you brought that up.

Cheers! c:

Gianni 2013-11-26 23:15:44

You should have seen me the first time I actually researched who was behind "we" when it first came across my plate. I'm pretty sure I stopped responding to e-mails entirely and then a few weeks later I sent them an e-mail like "Nah, but good luck I guess." Not very professional, but neither is my complete lack of sobriety for seventy percent of my recordings.

I agree with the collaboration point. Again, from the amateur VA perspective at least, not doing my shit for free wouldn't really make sense for most of the projects I sign up for. But yeah, a proper business can pony up. Buy your assets, motherfucker. That's what the budget graph is for.

Sabtastic 2013-11-26 23:15:44

Amen brother. :p

Doomroar 2013-11-26 23:18:22

What a great advice, exposure will helpful doesn't really grants you much besides just that.

Sabtastic 2013-11-26 23:18:22

It's totally helpful...! It's honestly one of the nicest things you could do for an artist if you appreciate their work, if you don't have money to show you support them.

It's just wrong from a business perspective, though. It's not legal tender.

Turd 2013-11-26 23:34:54

This is the most intelligent discussion I've ever seen on Newgrounds & I love it.

Sabtastic 2013-11-26 23:34:54

hahaha thanks man

Knights 2013-11-27 00:12:37

By "exposure", you don't mean things like internships, right? As an artist just starting out, I'm hoping to get connections and experience by interning at a relatively known production company over the summer, and am nervous that my time will be wasted because of it. I should also mention that this internship is sponsored by my university, so I'm positive it's legit, but I still want to make sure I'm not being used here.

Sabtastic 2013-11-27 00:12:37 (Updated 2013-11-27 01:19:14)

Oh - good point. Internships actually look good on a resume, though. They're totally beneficial if it's related to something you actually want to do.

Normally that's something that -you- go out and apply for, though. People don't come randomly out of the blue offering you unpaid internship work, if I understand it all correctly. (...right?)

I guess the important part is, if you do something for said internship that's worth money, and that company makes a profit off of your singular or collaborative efforts, they need to compensate you somehow---whether that be a physical payment or a letter of reference that you can use to get a job.

YoutubeIsawesome 2013-11-27 02:52:03

Some people like that

or you could just get some causal job while you do the work on the side

Sabtastic 2013-11-27 02:52:03

Yes, but a casual job on the side still deserves to be paid work, am I right?
You wouldn't sign up for a part-time job that only paid you if you were employee of the month-- it's unfair to everyone else.

MisterHerbal 2013-11-27 07:10:43

AMEN. PREACH BROTHER, PREACH.

bigjonny13 2013-11-27 07:54:22

Ah, this brings to back to many of the great discussions we've had in the art forum. This topic in particular has made the rounds a few times, including that video from Stephen Silver.

Sabtastic 2013-11-27 07:54:22

lol I just ended up finding this little jem, too:

"19 Ways to make an Illustrator Grind their Teeth to Bloody Stumps"
http://usvsth3m.com/post/61672228017/19-ways-to-make-an-illustrator-grind-their-teeth-to

SkuhPlew 2013-11-27 13:28:33

Is Carly Rae Jepsen really attending? Sounds exciting.

Kel-chan 2013-11-27 13:48:02

Yah I saw this before.

Since artists are so desperate for any kind of exposure or pay they sell themselves out.

Man...I'm glad I'm not an artist lol

TrueMisfit 2013-11-27 14:13:04

This is good advice, though I also think it should go as a case by case basis.
What if you're trying to help out a friend with something else by using your artwork?

For instance, I am starting up an indie game company and obviously need a little bit of catchy art stuffs to look at, and I have plenty of friends who can draw really well!
But this means I kinda have, ya know, no money.

What if they were mostly doing this to help me out? In this case exposure is really the only thing I could offer.

Sabtastic 2013-11-27 14:13:04

Whatever you do, just don't -ever- promise them money if you can't deliver.
One example is "I'll split the ad revenue with you when it's done" or "when I start making profits--" etc, etc.

Make sure they know you can't pay them and make it 100% clear, so they have the chance to decide on the financial risk, or whether or not to help you out as a friend.

I don't mean to bash indie game developers or anything -- I realize that the financial risk is pretty significant and you don't get a pay-out until someone sponsors you or you make it big.

VicariousE 2013-11-27 18:17:30

You made another post like this a while ago, didn't you? Still, it's good to keep saying it, and putting things in perspective. Oddly enough, I've got the opposite problem... paid for a commission up front, and no words, sketches, or any contact at all! Pretty expensive one too :(

Apatheria 2013-11-27 20:31:15

I've dealt with this a lot as a freelance voice actor, too. "It's good exposure and I'll be sure to put your name in the credits!" - as if being credited is a privilege in and of itself, when it's something the producer is -always supposed to do- anyway.

This lady knows her stuff, folks. Pay close attention to this article, and follow this advice!

Sabtastic 2013-11-27 20:31:15

Gosh, voice actors must get it twice as bad as artists do...! People seem to have the mindset that you're making something out of nothing, so since it doesn't cost money to create, it should be free too. :I Nobody ever realizes how expensive the friggin' eqipment and software is, n'or do they appreciate the skill of the voice behind the microphone.

@Ockeroid was saying he always gets comments like that himself, as if it's only the lack of equipment preventing any average joe from becoming a famous voice actor lol

Sorry you gotta put up with this crap too, Apa. :V

jennyleigh 2013-11-27 20:41:24

Thank you so much for posting this! I believe I was caught up in this. I did some freelance work for this group of people who couldn't pay me but i looked at it that i would be getting publicity so to speak. i told them i'd like money to do more art for them and they said they could try and pay me but im a little hesitant to do it now. im super busy right now anyways so i had to back out of the project for now. i really appreciate this post however! :)

the-Dark-Neighbor 2013-11-27 23:15:02

You said it. I'm a graphic designer and copywriter who is relatively new at freelancing, and I wish I had seen your post six months ago. Thanks for spreading the word and cautioning others who are looking to get into this (often highly underappreciated) field.

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